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12 November 2010

As a public service, I thought it would be a good idea to illustrate what phishing looks like.

This e-mail arrived this morning and it stinks to high heaven. Never mind that the request is absurd and rife with sloppy grammar. Official Google correspondence never comes from a Gmail address.

As a side note, if you have a Gmail address, be sure to register it fully with Google. Google will shut down a Gmail account if its security has been breached. Once that happens you're screwed unless you filled out the contact information completely by associating a mobile number or alternative, non-Gmail e-mail address.

Should you find your Gmail account's been shut down there's a procedure in place to identify yourself and get it unlocked. Google will send you a message and on it will be a link that tells Google you want to claim your account and get it unlocked. Once they know you want to get back into your account, they will send an access code via text message or e-mail to a non-Gmail address. If they can't get that access code to you you're in for a whole lot of heartache. So if you're a Gmail user, add a mobile number to the account.

If they have a mobile number to work with, it takes about five minutes to get an account unlocked from my experience. Register those accounts!

It's in Change Account Settings in the Accounts and Import tab. Once you click on that, you'll see a screen that has the access for all of your Google accounts. Once you're there, look for Security in Personal Settings. Click Change password recovery options. Make sense?